WIP WednesdayThis week hasn’t been as productive as some, because I’m waiting to hear about my submission of Heart’s Ultimatum. Whenever I have a submission out I have a horrible time concentrating on anything besides refreshing my inbox. I know, as a professional writer, I should be better at ignoring the submission out and moving on to the next thing. I hope I’m getting better but I’m still not very good at it. If you’re a writer, and you can ignore waiting to hear about a submission, you’re a rock star in my mind. I can’t do it. It doesn’t help, that I love Heart’s Ultimatum so much, and really hope that someone else will too. However I have made some progress on my two writing fronts at the moment. As soon as I wrote, on WIP last Wednesday, that I was going to give my shifter story time to simmer and focus on something else, my hero Hunter opened right up and started talking. I think it was in part because I’d been so focused on finding out his secrets that I couldn’t really think, and a little because I was scared of how dark Hunter is. But the majority of it was Hunter. The more I learn about him, the more I understand, that it’s only when I’m ready to walk away he’ll reveal the truth. Poor Madison is going to have her hands full with this guy. I’m still a little fuzzy on the story, and I feel like something might be missing, but I’ve started to write a little. Usually writing is how I discover the truth of the story. Knowing the characters, and how they will react in every situation is very important, but it isn’t until I get them reacting that I can figure out what happens next. Here’s my favorite piece from what I’ve written so far. This part talks about Madison’s connection to her human foster family, and the connection, or lack thereof, she had to the pack before she left. *Remember this is very rough and subject to edits and possible deletion. “Mady,” Sharron called from the doorway, walking quickly over to her and embracing mother and child in a large hug. Sharron showed affection so easily, hugging, kissing, patting, holding. After seven years Madison still found it amazing. Her own mother had never been so affectionate. Compassion was never praised in the pack, over deadly instinct or fighting prowess. There’s a reason wolves aren’t known for their cuddly qualitiesI’ve also made some progress on Wandering, which I still plan to have done and submitted by the end of the month no matter how much Madison and Hunter try to distract me. I’ve cleaned up all the sheets (I had some pages hand written on with changes, due to a failed zip drive that Naughty List was the only work to survive, thankfully). I’ve compiled everything, and I’m finishing up the character profiles on my two main characters. Even though I wrote this work almost two years ago, I didn’t do character profiles back then, and given that I’m looking at this work with new eyes I thought they might be helpful. I plan to get started on in depth revisions today. Hopefully they’ll go quick, since this work has been revised many times, but I’m feeling the need to add a little more, for character depth, so we’ll see where ends up. It’s amazing to me, as I read it how much I’ve grown and changed as a writer in the last two years. Yet I still love these characters, and still love this story. I want to see if find the home and audience it deserves. Hopefully, with a little elbow grease, I’ll be able to do that now.